The Exiles
by Kayka
Summary: Funny things happen when you meddle with time. Post DoFP: The Rogue Cut. Victrie. Chapter 2 of 5.
1. Nonstandard Deviation

**A/N:** This little plot bunny has been poking at my brain since the Rogue Cut came out. There is also the fact that I continue to be disappointed by the absence of Liev and/or Sabretooth in any form in these new movies, and therefore this little story was born. On one hand, this is 'all X-Men movies up to and including DoFP: the Rogue Cut' compliant. On the other hand, I have taken gross liberties with some stuff from the comics and this is utterly AU. Let's just say it diverges immediately post-DoFP.

* * *

 **Chapter 1: Nonstandard Deviation**

* * *

"Easy there."

Sabretooth kept his hands visible and his movements slow.

Marie never dropped her defensive posture, waiting on him to make his first fatal move.

But then again, he was _already dead_. Rogue had watched it happen years ago, right after the world completely went to hell.

She'd never liked the man; hadn't known much of him aside from the fact that he had a feral mutation, once kidnapped her, and that he'd railed against the sentinels right from the beginning. Barely knowing what they were dealing with, Victor Creed had been one of the first to fall.

Yet here Sabretooth was, distinctly not-dead. She would even venture so far as to say he appeared to be alive and whole.

None of _this_ made sense, anyway.

Rogue had awoken alone some time-Minutes? Or was it hours?- ago under dense foliage and warm air that hung denser, still. The cloying atmosphere roused long neglected memories of Meridan summers, when she had been someone else. Back then, her biggest worries had been Trig and whether Cody Ray thought she was cute.

Rogue didn't miss those days, not precisely. She missed their simplicity and potential, but nostalgia was a lying bitch and reminiscing about 'never-were's' wouldn't help with her present situation.

And that situation was... a dream; it had to be- she hadn't seen so much green since she was a teenager. The major sticking point in her theory was the fact that Marie did not dream, she hadn't since before she'd been captured and held prisoner in her former home. Not that said former home looked much like the Professor's school anymore.

She'd been freed, though- Marie remembered holding Logan's consciousness in the past to complete his mission to set the world to rights.

Had they succeeded, or was this after the end of the world? If so, she wondered at how the broken and gray planet had become untamed and beautiful so quickly.

No, that couldn't be right. There was no evidence of civilization anywhere to be seen. If they'd succeeded where was everyone else?

Was she _dead_? If she were, that might explain the presence of Creed. She'd been good though, hadn't she? Why was she cursed to spend her afterlife with Sabretooth?

"You're not dead."

Marie's eyes widened as she felt the first wellings of panic. He wasn't a telepath now, too, was he? The scientists did all kinds of experiments, especially at the beginning, trying to blend and manipulate the mutations of those captured. They'd certainly tried with her, aiming to figure out how her mutation ticked. Maybe they'd kept him alive and-

"Jesus, calm the hell down. You were talking to yourself."

 _Not a telepath._ Rogue relaxed marginally.

She hadn't even realized she had been speaking aloud. She probably ought to be concerned about that. In the rare moments they wanted her conscious she had been isolated. So, yes, to concerned, no, to surprised.

Marie didn't even know how long ago she had been imprisoned. The team worked out a system to warn them, but it wasn't perfect- her capture was evidence enough of that. How much time had passed in the interim was a mystery.

"What the fuck happened to you, Rogue?"

Creed just shot any hope she had that _he_ knew what was going on here straight to hell.

Rogue ignored him, and tried to concentrate. Sensing her dismissal, Victor interrupted again.

"Get tired of playing daddy with ol' bucket head?"

 _Ugh_. It figured that her subconscious would conjure up the grossest person possible. The damned man didn't even have the decency to be ignored in her own dreams. Marie added 'annoying' to her mental checklist of things she knew about Victor Creed.

Though, for whatever reason, dream!Sabretooth seemed to be angling for a conversation rather than disembowelment, at the moment. Weren't dreams supposed to be a way to work though your issues? She had a lot of those, and the list was growing. Why not humor her delusion?

"Bucket head?" She asked.

The man's sharp gaze scrutinized her, as if he were looking for something, and she was coming up short.

"Magento? Ring any bells?"

 _Oh. Eww._

Nope. Screw dealing with her issues. Rogue flexed her hand, and it responded. It was a lucid dream, then. Maybe if she focused really hard, she could imagine herself to a nice beach somewhere, but first-

"Why the _hell_ would I go any where near Magneto? And why aren't _you_ dead?"

 _Yes, let's Ask the dream man why he's following dream logic. Smooth, brainiac._

Creed's brow creased.

"Should I be?" He asked in a carefully neutral tone.

"Yes. Sentinels." Rogue replied.

His face twisted in offense, and Marie easily counted this the strangest conversation she'd ever had with a dead man. Though that very well might be a pot-and-the-kettle train of thought, if this _wasn't_ a dream.

"Those hunk-o-junk machines take me out? Ain't found a way to kill me yet, sweets. Sorry, to disappoint. "

He acted like the world had not been taken over by those quote-unquote hunks of junk. Granted, that when he died, it hadn't quite yet.

But dream or not, _dead_ or not, Sabretooth should remember the approval of the Mutant Registration Act and a renewed Sentinel Program.

This could be some kind of new torture her loving team of scientists had cooked up: zapping her brain and give her terrible dreams. Marie was developing a massive headache, and that sounded about right. So much, for a restful sleep. She tried imagining a calm, peaceful beach, again.

During her inattention, Creed darted in close and sniffed. He jerked away before she could protest, much less defend herself.

"Of fuckin' course. You ain't her." He announced, as though that explained everything.

"Excuse me?"

"You know how you got here, Rogue?"

The beach thing wasn't working, so Marie changed her tactic. She imagined Creed in a floral, pink muumuu, scrunching her eyes closed as she did. For spite she added a matching shower cap. When she opened her eyes again... he was exactly as he had been moments before, dressed in worn denim and a black tank.

"No," she admitted, reluctantly. Lately, it seemed like she didn't know much of anything though- like Kitty having powers that could blast someone's mind to the past.

"Well take a good look around. This is Earth-"

He paused, and Rogue inadvertently followed his suggestion. Of course, it was Earth.

"Just ain't one either of us were born on."

So that was it; Marie was officially coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs. Took her long enough. Or maybe she actually _was_ dreaming, but not lucidly enough to really affect the dream itself. That sucked.

Especially the Sabretooth part, but that was your subconscious for you. Which was likely-

"You're not fuckin' crazy, goddammit."

She really needed to get that talking to herself thing checked out. Or dream!Sabretooth really was a telepath.

He raked his claws through his mane of blond hair, pulling it from its ponytail.

She'd frustrated him. _Good._ Came the whisper from her subconscious, at least she _thought_ it was her subconscious. It could have been one of the voices she hadn't heard in ages, but she couldn't match the flavor to anyone in particular.

"I'm not a telepath, either. Just pay attention, dammit!" He surged forward, grabbing her arm, his claws prickling her skin through the sleeve. "This feel like a dream?"

 _Well, no_. It hurt in a definitely not-dream way. But then again, she hadn't had enough dreams recently to create a good basis for comparison.

Disgusted, he dropped her arm and released a sharp exhale through his nose.

"I'm not whatever version of me that you know- You're not my Rogue, and I'm not your Sabretooth, got it? THIS is where-"

Creed froze mid-sentence and sniffed at the air-

"You gotta be fuckin' kidding me," he grumbled. _Grumbled, like a petulant child._

And for some reason that struck her as hilarious. She told him as much between giggles. Cracked? Maybe she was, but she couldn't muster the wherewithal to care, just now.

Once she recovered from her cackle-fit Rogue heard thunder in the distance. The sun peaked through the canopy, but it could be a fast moving system.

"Not thunder, but fast moving is right."

Then, the ground started shaking. _Great. An earthquake._

Maybe she was finally waking up? Bizarre though it seemed, this dream was the most interesting thing to happen to her in recent memory, and now that waking up might be imminent, she felt reluctant to do so.

"What is it?"

"Not sure, the wind shifted, and we're upwind now. Whatever it is, it's big and don't smell like no spring chicken."

The rumbling of the ground grew stronger.

"Get off the path! Move it!"

The man grabbed her gloved hand and yanked, Rogue stumbling into his side.

"What the hell?"

She ineffectually tried to pull out of Sabretooth's hold. Her definitely-not-dream-guy turned to level a glare at her as he tugged her along. It was decidedly a 'I will rip this arm off and take it with me if you don't quit it' kind of glare.

Marie decided to let him think she'd given in. She just needed to grab his wrist with her other arm and drain the bastard, then she'd be free to turn around and run the other way.

A screeching roar thundered from behind them.

Okay, maybe not the _other_ way. Running ninety degrees from her current trajectory was probably a better idea.

Just as she pulled off her glove with her teeth, something huge, toothy, and scaly-red burst through the underbrush behind them.

Dream or not, Marie jerked her arm free and ran for her life.

* * *

 **Next Time:** A waterlogged kitty is good at braiding hair.

 **A/N:** This is going to be a shorter story, likely four to five chapters depending on how I split it up. Let me know what you think!


	2. String Cheese Theory

**Chapter 2: String Cheese Theory**

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"Get the lead out!" Creed shouted from in front of her.

"I'm running! As fast! As I can!" Marie huffed in between strides. Months, or more probably, years, of being strapped to a damned table was hell for one's cardio. In less than two minutes, she already had a stitch in her side. She used to be able to run for-

"That thing's fucking red! Are the supposed to be fucking _red_?!"

Rogue wasn't about to turn around to get a better look. Whatever the creature was, it had honed in on the pair of them the moment she instinctively scrambled away.

Creed was now paces ahead of her, and the gap widened by the second. The creature- not a tyrannosaurus rex! In absolutely no way a tyrannosaurus rex!- was only slightly hindered by the dense growth of the jungle, and as it stood, she wouldn't be able to keep up her current pace much longer.

If she'd been capable, Marie would have punched the man running in front of her. Instead, her general ire took the form of pitching forward over a protruding root and twisting her ankle. She went down hard.

 _God dammit._

Marie thought she heard a growled curse over the creature's rapid, thunderous approach. Sabretooth flashed in front of her, as she ineffectually tried to rise. He grabbed her off the ground and flipped her over his shoulders in a fireman's carry. The gaping, snapping maw narrowly missed the pair of them as Creed dashed away.

"You just had to run didn't you? Yes, let's run from the fucking red t-Rex. Let's get scratched up in the process so it thinks we're prey and chases after us."

She didn't even get the chance to retort that this was all his fault before he veered off to the left, and the ground disappeared.

"Shit. Hold on, frail!"

Gravity asserted itself, and air rushed up around them. Marie frantically grabbed at Creed's shirt and hair, gaining a tenuous grasp on both. They were falling, and dammit, she didn't want to die in this stupid dream.

The roaring screech stopped abruptly behind them. She thought she caught a glimpse of a void with shimmering edges, but it glimmered so quickly, she couldn't be sure.

Before she could decide one way or the other what she had seen, the pair plunged into a deep pool of water. Rogue's vision blared white as her injured ankle jarred upon impact. Water rushed up her nose and down her throat; she sucked more than a healthy amount down as she tried to surface. A massive hand reached for her, hauling her up by the shoulder and holding her head above water.

She sputtered trying to get a decent breath, pushing away the feral man's supporting hand.

"You good?"

Rogue nodded stubbornly, though every kick to hold herself above the surface was agony.

"Just so you know, I hate you. A lot." Rogue decreed.

He threw back his head and laughed. Maybe she wasn't the only one that was cracked.

"Y'know, we might just get on all right. You ain't really sunshine and daisies yourself, girlie. "

Marie didn't know what to say to that - this man was so utterly aberrant from what she expected of Sabretooth that she didn't know how to take him.

So, she kept quiet and took the opportunity to examine the newest development in her surroundings.

The cliff they'd taken a dive off of was higher than Marie expected. So, it was no wonder her foot was killing her. She reluctantly noted that Creed must have taken the brunt of the impact, but she didn't wish dwell on the implications of that.

The greenery up above was so ubiquitous that Marie doubted she would be able to find the way back. Not that it mattered, she supposed. Even if she could find the way, there was nowhere to go back _to_.

Like the atmosphere in this place, the water was uncomfortably tepid, and even now, insects were swarming not far away. The newly tattered jumpsuit she wore was never meant for _this_ particular kind of abuse. And she didn't even want to contemplate pulling out all the brush and bramble she'd accumulated in her hair during their run.

The Thing- Marie wasn't quite ready to call it a T-Rex as she limited herself to one inexplicable oddity at a time- really had disappeared, though. Surely she would have heard it lumbering away, and probably screeching, if it had managed to stop and turned around. By all rights, the Thing should have crashed down on top of them.

"Where'd it go?" Rogue asked.

"Portal. Most things don't stay long." Creed didn't dwell on the subject. "You need to get out so I can see that ankle."

 _Like hell._ He might or might not be what he said he was, but she wasn't keen on finding out his brand of medical attention. Marie swam toward the edge of the pool.

Or tried to, rather.

Creed cleared his throat, offering his arm.

"No," Rogue refused.

"Whatever. I ain't coddling ya."

And with a kick that splashed water all over her, he swam quickly to land.

 _Asshole._

Being careful of her injured ankle, her progress was far slower than her companion's. It felt like an hour later that Rogue finally hoisted herself onto the shore.

Sabretooth was nowhere to be seen, and the lengthening shadows heralded the day drawing to a close.

 _Fantastic._

Her jumpsuit clung to her skin uncomfortably. With the humidity being so high, it wasn't likely to dry soon, despite the heat.

She peeled the offending garment away, and was sitting in a sports bra and panties when Creed returned. She hadn't been willing to pull the jumpsuit over her now swollen appendage and had given up trying to tear the fabric several minutes before. There wasn't much she could do for the superficial scratches she'd acquired, either. She couldn't even muster anyone's mutation.

Creed's mutation could heal her, but she'd almost rather let her wounds fester before letting the likes of him in her head.

So, Marie turned her frustrations toward her hair- attempting to work the snarls and debris she'd picked up since landing in this god forsaken jungle.

It was not going well, and she could feel Sabretooth's eyes on her. She was vaguely grateful he had missed the undignified crawling.

"Take a picture, Creed. It'll last longer."

He dropped the bundle of wood he carried and plopped down in front of her. She could feel his continued scrutiny, but Rogue elected to ignore it.

"Not that I'm opposed to the show, but what the hell are you trying to accomplish?"

Marie glared through unflattering, scraggly strands of hair and continued trying to pull the twigs and prickly burrs free. She wasn't in the mood to deal with him, nor the increasing likely that this wasn't just some messed up dream.

"I'm just sayin' _that_ ain't helping and you're going to make it worse, if you keep jerking it like that."

The man reached forward and with a few deft movements, pulled the bit of twig she'd been fighting free, sans the clump of hair she might have pulled with it. "…You gotta be patient and work it out."

Rogue wasn't sure if he was really talking about her hair, or their unfortunately shared predicament. Then again, she'd never pinned Victor Creed as the philosophical type, so, the parallel universe idea was gaining credence by the minute.

He was already working a leaf out of her hair before she thought to protest. The tangled mass was his fault in some measure, she rationalized, so in the end, Rogue kept her big trap shut and let him.

Creed worked thoroughly and efficiently, climbing behind her when he's finished with the front. He surprised her again, with small talk of all things.

"Gotten a few dinosaurs here before, some kinda raptors and the plant eating kinds, but that's the first time I've seen a goddamned tyrannosaurus rex."

"And where is _here_ , exactly?"

"You got some kinda memory thing going on? I told you. It's earth, but not ours. This is where you end up when you fuck something up real bad and the universe doesn't know what to do with you."

Which didn't answer her question at all. She told him as much.

" _And?_ How'd you work that out? You get dumped in the jungle so this _must_ be a different universe?"

At some point he'd finished tugging debris free and had moved on to finger combing the snarls out of her hair. Despite her throbbing ankle, her state of semi-undress, and the fact it was Creed, Marie relaxed for the first time in recent memory.

"You got live dinosaurs back home?"

"No, but-"

"I know because I got eyes in my damned head. The air tastes different. And there's goddamn portals every five feet."

He'd mentioned the portals before.

"Portals," Rogue repeated, dubiously.

"That's what I've been callin' 'em. But it's more like that string theory shit. Quantum resolution."

Once he started talking, he didn't seem inclined to stop- going on about quantum states and Schroedinger's cat like her very own, very bizarre, PBS special.

Absently, she noticed he had a nice voice.

She had nearly dozed off when her pillow shifted behind her. Fortunately, or unfortunately, he hadn't even brushed up against her bare skin once.

"They don't really resolve. The cat's alive and dead- just in different branches of the multiverse."

Creed moved away to build a fire out of the scavenged wood.

She couldn't resist reaching up to feel her hair- he'd braided it and seemed to actually know how. She couldn't see her reflection from here, but it wasn't like it could be any worse than the rat's nest it had been before.

Marie contemplated scooting over to the pool's edge to examine his handiwork when she drew up short.

 _Victor Creed braiding hair and waxing poetic about physics?_

She must be completely off her rocker.

"Pinch me."

He huffed. "When will you give this up? I ain't a dream."

"Sorry," she replied in a tone that implied she was anything but. "It doesn't add up."

"I just explained it. Did you listen to a damn thing I just said?"

"Yeah, but it's just so _sci-fi_ , and it's either true, I'm dreaming, or I've finally gone crazy. Dreaming or me being batshit crazy makes more sense. Besides, I never expected any version of Sabretooth to be a nerd."

"A man has to have his hobbies," he returned, defensively.

"I thought all of _your_ hobbies involved kidnapping, raping, and murdering," the words were out of her mouth before she even really contemplated them.

His jaw clenched, and if she hadn't been watching him so closely, she would have missed the glimmer of surprise that flashed across his face before it shuttered away.

Marie almost felt bad for her accusation, but even if he was telling the truth about being from a different universe, a tiger didn't just change his stripes. Sabretooth was _Sabretooth_ , after all.

"Yeah, well, I thought you, of all people, would buck up and manage to keep your shit together. Yet here you are, frail and scared to death. Looks like we were both wrong."

With that, Creed disappeared into the night. Marie sincerely doubted he would return a second time.

* * *

 **A/N:** Yes, that was a tiny, sort-of Devil Dinosaur cameo because reasons.

 **Next Time:** Heigh-ho! Heigh ho! To Victor's house we go! …But maybe not Marie?


End file.
